Method for correcting seismic simulations, RTM, and FWI for temporal dispersion due to temporal finite difference methods in which time derivatives are approximated to a specified order of approximation. Computer-simulated seismic data (51) are transformed from time domain to frequency domain (52), and then resampled using a mapping relationship that maps, in the frequency domain, to a frequency at which the time derivative exhibits no temporal dispersion (53), or to a frequency at which the time derivative exhibits a specified different order of temporal dispersion. Alternatively, measured seismic data from a field survey (61) may have temporal dispersion of a given order introduced, by a similar technique, to match the order of approximation used to generate simulated data which are to be compared to the measured data.